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thirty-two
I Don’t Like People
Sloane
The rest of the day is full of juggling mentors and students, and when I finally get to my office, I find Fiona pacing with a strange expression on her face.
“What’s the matter?” My foot taps rapidly as scenarios race through my mind. Cooper lying unconscious on the side of the road or wrapped around a telephone pole. My fingernails dig into my palms as imaginings of hospitals and ambulances flash before my eyes.
“Have a seat, Sloane. I need to tell you something.”
“Oh my God, it’s Cooper, isn’t it? Something’s happened, hasn’t it? Please don’t say that. Please don’t say something has happened to him.” I haven’t moved, and my heart is about to jump out of my chest.
Fiona grabs my arm and shakes me a bit before pushing me into a seat. “No. It’s not Cooper. I talked to their manager, and he just went out of town for the day. As far as I know, he’s fine.”
I release my held breath in a whoosh and try to calm my racing heart. Though it’s taking me a while to stop the horror movies playing in my brain. I’ve been getting worked up way too quickly lately. It’s not like me.
“Jesus Christ, you scared the crap out of me.”
“Get your shit together, woman.” She stops and takes a deep breath before continuing. “Remember how our IT guy Carl was looking into the e-mail issue we had with Cooper at the beginning of the session?”
It takes me a minute to translate what she said into a thought in my head, but I finally catch up to what she’s saying, and the context now makes sense. “Yeah, did he finally find something?”
“He did. And you’ll be shocked at who messed with my e-mail.” She leans against her desk and crosses her arms, and as I look at her closely, I see that she’s highly unsettled. Instantly, my heart starts racing again because seeing her like this is not normal. It takes a lot to ruffle Fiona’s feathers.
“Well, who was it?”
“Penny Hawkins.”
I can’t have heard her correctly.
“Did you just say, Penny? Penny Hawkins? The most talented student we have in the program?” I can’t wrap my head around this. “You’re saying she hacked your e-mail?”
She nods, and even that can’t convince me Penny would do something like this. “According to Carl, she intercepted the original e-mail before it was delivered and was able to reroute it through her own, but she was able to hide her e-mail address somehow. I don’t know. I’m not a hacker. And to be honest, I’m just taking Carl’s word for it because he seemed to know what he was talking about.”
“I can’t believe Penny would do this.” I stand up and start pacing where Fiona left off. “Why would she? Why would she want to tell Cooper our meeting was at a different time? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Well, it got you two to fight, didn’t it?” She starts tapping her chin as she speaks. “If she has feelings for him, which I’ve told you, I think she does. That poor girl has it bad. Then what better way to get a chance with him than to screw up yours.”
I shake my head. “I’m telling you she does not have a thing for Cooper. It’s Ethan she has feelings for.”
“Well, regardless, we need to talk with her. Should I call her now, or do you want to?”
My stomach drops as something else occurs to me. “Do you think she’s the one who destroyed Cooper’s guitar? It said, ‘liar.’ Did she misunderstand something with him and think he lied about something?”
Fiona lets out a deep breath. “Holy shit, that’s a good point. What if she is the one who did that, too? What are we going to do?”
My heart breaks thinking of this poor girl whose emotions are too big for her to handle, but then I remember the destruction and mayhem she’s caused because of it, and there is no way to justify it. No matter what she may have been feeling, that is no excuse to mess with people’s lives and destroy their property.
“What do you think? Should we call her in now? Or should I talk to or confront her tomorrow when she shows up for class?” The idea of a confrontation with Penny hurts, but she can’t get away with what she’s done either.
“Part of me wants to say wait. But most of me wants me to say this needs to be nipped in the bud immediately.” She grabs my arm to stop me from pacing, and I turn to her. “You can’t let your feelings for Penny get in the way. I know you and her are close, but you know what the right thing to do is.”
I nod. “I know. Can you get her to come in now? I’m going to call Cooper and let him know what’s going on. I have a feeling he might want to be around when we talk to her.”
I barely sit when Fiona comes into my office, gripping her phone so tightly that I think she’s going to break it. “Um, we have a problem.”
“What is it now?” I can’t imagine anything else can go wrong today. But in that, I would be wrong.
